In the above fantastically geographic photo, we see President Barack Obama in the Oval Office, looking at a map donated to the White House by the National Geographic Society. The photo was taken on June 10, 2009 by Pete Souza, White House photographer. It's great to see the Commander-In-Chief using a map and thinking geographically about the issues at hand. Thanks to Geographile for pointing out this great photo.
Comments
That is a fantastic photo! As an America, I definitely feel that we don’t look at maps enough! If we did, it may help us understand the rest of the world a little better…
Mona dear,fantastic photo? As an American I definitely think I am going to puke.
I was annoyed that the photo of the president looking at a world map should elicit such gushing response. When I went to school there were maps displayed in every classroom. Then suddenly Geography and History as grade school subjects disappeared to never more appear. (Replaced? By something called Social Science) When I was in third grade I had already learned about Mesopotamia (Iran, Persia) and the principal cities of Baghdad and Basra, the Rivers, Tigris and Euphrates (i.e. the land between the rivers).
Later, during World War II newspapers printed maps every day. Often they printed several maps a day. We knew about the various theatres whether it was in the Philippines, Burma, Wake or Iwo Jima, Manchuria, Poland, Finland, Norway, the Russian front – I could fatuously list many, many more. Since then Americans have in my opinion become quite stupid. Embarrassingly stupid. So to me looking at a map is quite unremarkable.
Looks like Barry is having a hard time trying to find the USA
He’s still searching for those 57 states.
I’m glad to see this picture. It’s great that the U.S., unlike countries such as the Iraq and South Africa and countries such as, now has better access to maps, and that this helps the other Asian countries such as only this can do.
Nice to see a President that can find Europe.
and not just Crawford(;
I like Don’s second posting. The replacement of history and geography with “social studies” has been a long, failed experiment. In the context of the pathetic reality of U.S. geographic ignorance, however, a geographically literate president is welcome news.
As geographer Harm de Blij has told my students, “Ignorance of geography is a threat to national security.” A series of presidents have proven him right in places as diverse as close as Nicaragua and Grenada and as far as Cambodia and Iraq.
That being the case, it is good to see a president who is thinking geographically. Let’s hope that education “reform” can be rolled back so that the next generation of citizens can join him!
Another plus for Obama.Isn’t he such a good role model!! No person should be allowed to take public office without being able to demonstrate basic geographical knowledge….also no student should be allowed to graduate or obtain a drivers licence unless they can,at the very least, go to a map and point out their own state ,county,city etc..And the morons who decide school curricula should be jailed for failing to include the study of geography…thereby contributing to the weakening of American youth. love Raedwulf
LOVE this picture… As a former GeoBee contestant, it saddens me that we don’t get much geography education anymore… All the elementary/secondary schools really do is the same two hundred years of American history, over and over and over again… Once I was drawing a map for some reason, and a kid walked over to it, pointed to China, and asked if it was the US. Sad really. In the words of Miss South Carolina, “I think the reason most Americans can’t identify America on a map is because they don’t have maps.”
Sigh. Judging from some of the comments one would think maps are rare and hard to get. What a lame excuse.
It is a mystery to me that a household that has even progressed to indoor plumbing and electric lights does not have a Rand McNally Road atlas ($ 5.97 at Wal*Mart) an Almanac (all kinds of maps and a treasure of geography information, for about $ 12) and an honest to goodness atlas (which needn’t be the most current). And why not a globe?
Excellent photo. Some great comments by Don too. Geography needs to become the corner stone of education, once again.
What would be interesting is what is inside the map cabinet. NGS began the tradition of giving the President a map cabinet during WWII with FDR. Inside the cabinet were maps of the theaters of war that the President used to keep informed of daily events. The cabinets are hand made by NGS carpenters.